New ‘Mad Max’ game trailer makes the Wasteland positively beautiful

Okay, so the “Mad Max” video game is its own thing, not directly tied to “Fury Road,” and shouldn't be approached as an adaptation or a companion piece at all. It's just “Max Max,” an original take on the world and the character that was developed at the same time as “Fury Road.” It's supposed to be a very separate thing, and when I spoke to George Miller in Austin, he said he'd had some input in big broad ways, but that the game design team at Avalanche Studios definitely did their own thing.

I can't wait to get my hands on this one. It looks like that rare licensed game where they've taken the things we know about the character and turned those things into smart fun gaming choices. This new gameplay trailer is almost ridiculously cool. I love that you build your own car, and that you can continually tweak and refine it. That's one of the things about Miller's world that I have always loved, that sense that even in the midst of the Apocalypse, people are still going to take the time to assert their personalities through their cars, their weapons, their clothes. They are still people, and they are still going to find ways to be individuals.

The combat looks like it's gnarly close-quarters stuff. Not big ridiculous martial arts, but instead, fight-for-your-life brutality. I would hope that one of the most important things you would do in the game would be the driving and the road combat. That's a big part of this demo, and it does feel like they've found a way to make it a driving game, but with the aesthetic lunacy of George Miller's movies. It's a beautiful game, at least in these screen shots, and I'm curious to see just how large a Wasteland the game allows you to explore.

Whatever the case, this is an enormously promising trailer. And is the implication that there is an actual Thunderdome level in there somewhere?

Bring it on.

“Mad Max” is available to play on September 1st, 2015.

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